Whilst it is fair to blame Blair for Iraq or even half baked constitutional reform he is not to blame for mass immigration; the British Electorate have only themselves to blame for voting in a referendum to stay in the EU; the greatest disaster to befall Britain since Hitler.

Ronnie Ince, Stone, Staffordshire

Simon. I think it is the pseling error. It is the Water loo That had all the pipes burst and Mr. Tony Blaire is holding on to the hose pipe that is dry only sand and blood in this. Well done. Thank you. You know how to to tackle the guys where did you leran SUMO

Firozali A Mulla MBA PhD, Dar-Es-Salaam, Tanzania

WOW!! Thank You!! Good Journalism is an endangered species & one rarely see,s it in public these days,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, What Does the P.M. have to say..........Good Morning Sir, How was your nap?? Did you have any bad dreams?? No, all the dreams were good ones, but this wake up is a bad one. Don't worry, George has a message from N01. for you. He is quite pleased with your latest question time performance. He say that the glory of the emterprise is about to dawn........................he said......................

Thomas Ward, Katama, U.S.A.

Every word of your article is true, Simon. Many parts of Basra are even now no go areas for the British Army despite Operation Spinbad. So much for the rosy picture of 'Let's go while things are going so well' - Blair's fantasy strapline for his own exit and ''legacy''. The link says it all:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=7565602&ft=1&f=3

Tony, Glasgow, UK

So you are still playing the same old record, you obviously don't seem to learn from history because you are stuck in groundhog day. Iraq is not the new Waterloo, in fact it is the new nothing, it is a unique in many regards situation. It is amazing how such opponents of the war take the moral high ground and point to the horror and death that has happened in Iraq since the invasion. I don't seem to remember you carping on, day after day after day, about the deaths of the hundreds of thousands of people under Sadam's regime. You turned a convenient blind eye then didn’t you! Was it out of sight out of mind, or did such deaths not present you with any pertinent political daggers? The hypocrisy of antiwar campaigners amazes me, they want a safe and peaceful world with the freedoms they love, yet are not prepared to do, or let others do, what is necessary to achieve it. Yours is a dangerous and unworkable ideology immoral in its naivety.

J W Randall, Edinburgh,

Good article

tom, London, UK

Is there anything really left to discuss on Iraq from a British perspective anymore, except, how many more young service lives will be wasted and lost and the cost both emotionally and fiscally to the British people?

Who cares about exit with honour. Bring them all home safe NOW!

The outcome will be the same regardless.

FS SUMMERS, LONDON,

Mr Jenkins is certainly correct in saying that, during his tenure, Mr Blair has continued to persue Thacherism in the public services at home.
I feel, however, that Mr Blair's motives for allying himself to the American cause and going to war in Iraq owe less to his own 'craving for a world role' and more to his honestly trying to maintain Britain's elevated position on the world stage.
Ever since the British Empire was at its height, Britain has punched above its economic weight internationally. It is my feeling that Mr Blair's decision to support the US in Iraq was his own clumsy attempt to preserve or even better this international standing.
In the future, as we look back on Mr Blair's foriegn policy in Iraq, it may be a little unfair to see him as hungering after a position of Napolionic statesmanship. I think we can probably absolve him of that kind of personal scheming as regards foriegn policy. More likely his decisions have been clumsy and basically, a bit crap.

Paul Goatman, Derby, UK

Mr. Jenkins believes that Saddam's departures, free elections and the writing of a Constitution are failures. To me such thinking is sad.

jai khosla, New York, new york/usa

Simon Jenkins writes: "Britain elected a prime minister with so strong a majority that he could overwhelm the normal checks placed on his office."

Is this not the crux of the problem? We need to separate election of the executive from election of parliament. Only then will our democracy have an adequacy of checks and balances, and the necessary lack of "pre-eminence" of any one part of the establishment.

Roll on a directly elected executive prime minister under a constitutional head of state.

Best regards

Nigel Sedgwick, Beaconsfield, UK

There is of course one event which is unmentioned by Simon Jenkins. Just what would be the state of the Parliamentary Labour Party today if Robin Cook had not met an untimely demise on a Scottish mountain? I have the feeling there would be a serious challenger to Brown, uncontaminated by Iraq. Besides, I disagree that Iraq is "the one policy that has wrecked his (Blair's) legacy". What about half baked constitutional reform? The threatened breakup of the UK? Unwanted and unsustainable mass immigration?

Richard Marriott, Kidderminster, England

Can't fault your arguement. What I find incomprehensible is that policies that have failed are being repeated vis-a-vis the Middle East, see now even with Iran. What is it with this Government and their narrow, amoral conceptualisation of the national interest. They have endangered it and brought us into disrepute yet still Blair wants to carry on as if he's right. The impact of his refusal to accept blame and the denial to the British people of their 'pound of flesh' for his betrayal through democractic accountability will be felt in growing radicalisation - and not just of Muslim youth. Upset about anything, take direct action, you will only be charged with terrorism if you happen to be Muslim and you are upset with foreign policy. That too is Blair's dangerous legacy.

papertiger, Bromley,

Chirac told him so: but as usual, all what is said to a British by an arrogant French is to be disdaigned...
Right from the beginning, the SDECE knew exactly what would happen, except the generalisation of suicide bombing that surprised finally everybody. Irak, like other Arab countries, have to be ruled by a strong man: who can be so stupid to believe that democracy can live in those countries with so many different tribes, with such different religious minds... Yes democracy that allows big firms to buy the essence of a country and ruin it after several shareholders greeding decisions...Surprising from England that had the experience of the country by creating Koweit...,

FRANCOIS, RIGA, LATVIA

I believe it has been a fisco from the beginning and I do feel sorry for our troops but also for the Iraqi civillians caught up in this horror show. As Simon Jenkins points out in his excellent article Blair has far exagerated his role in the whole thing, I remember Rumsfield offered us a way out pre-invasion and simply said that the USA would continue without us , Blair had to stand shoulder to shoulder with Bush on the invasion but as soon as that was accomplished he should have angled a way out for our troops having seen the looting etc. and a complete lack of planning .As a result we are still stuck there and Blair still refuses to accept any responsiblty other than to say the overthrow of Saddam and freedom for the Iraqi people were his real objectives and the weapons of mass destruction of no real importance, and yet he denied it was about regime change before the illegal invasion.He must think that we are all as deluded as he obviously is, the sooner the man goes the better.

william beeby, dover, england

I was chilled to read that Blair will be handing over battle tanks to those remaining in Basra when we leave. Say it isn't true!

Brian Lewis, Manila, Philippines

How can Blair state that "bringing democracy to Iraq" was worth the bloodshed that followed when he so overtly ignores his own democratic process in Parliament and in Britain?

Caroline Kennedy, San Jose, Costa Rica

I am sure that we wont get reasonable, balanced international policy until we abandon this meaningless word democracy. Probably not even then, reading your description of this mess that surrounds the middle east, but it is worth trying.

Henry Percy, London, UK

I don't understand your title? Waterloo was a great British & Prussian victory, I don't think Basra will be.
Afghanistan might well be though!

A STANDLEY, Doncaster,

I think that Terry Daly misses the point. Our democratic system has its flaws which allow a Prime Minister with 'so strong a majority that he could overwhelm the normal checks placed on his office'. With half the people in society disengaged from politics such a majority can be had from a minority of the electorate, this should not be considered a mandate and without the normal checks what is there to control the excesses of an individual?

Andy Northridge, Maidstone, Kent

Well, at least you can say that Blair has a 100% record as his legacy. Along with the invasion of Iraq there is not a single thing his government has made a success of. NHS, Education. Immigration, Law and Order ect ect ect

D Case, Newquay, uk

A further comparison with Walpole's government is that this has been the the most venal and corrupt since the Norfolk apple eater commanded the Commons for some twenty years. Thank God Blair is going after ten !

David West, Templecombe, Somerset

To suggest that democracy in Iraq is working is a sick joke and the spin that its a success has been perpetuated by Bush & Blair to try and legitimize an illegal war. Democracies in the west were formed from within those counties, by the common people and have never been imposed from outside. The only case where external force was used with success required the partitioning of the Balkans to halt a civil war and and allow ethnic boundaries to define the new member states. Exactly the same could work in Iraq if Bush/Blair had followed the same route but trying to mix three ethnic groups was predicted not to work, is not working and certainly will never work. Reading the comments from Terry Daly suggest to me he's on planet Blair along with all the other neo-cons who are in denial over the reality of Iraq today. There is a civil war going on, the US/UK allowed it to happen, were unable to stop it and for the record, Britain pulled out of Afghanistan once before as it was ungovernable.

Mike, Denia, Spain

The last comment was ironic right?

Its cut and run or stay and be pushed. The invasion supporters got there war and the Iranians got handed thr gift of a broken western army with its strength evaporating.

Terry there are a lot of vacancies in the army at the moment you could join up? or how about pay some voluntary tax for this war and sell your house to buy the troops some gear?

Jeremy, Stockbridge, Hampshire

Liberals should decide amongst themselves whether they think it was right for British troops to be deployed in Bosnia, Kosovo, Sierra Leone, Afganistan and Iraq. I believe that it was morally right each time, that British troops have saved thousands of lives by interposing themselves between factions who would otherwise have slaughtered each other, that the individual British soldiers who undertake these thankless tasks are true heroes. In Iraq, it is better to have tried and - possibly - failed than not to have tried at all. Maybe the locals will pull back from the brink after we leave...the reputation of the British Army will be intact.

Len Angel, Motueka, NZ

Spot on! The media compares Iraq to Suez, a pathetic little 6 day misadventure. Mr jenkins is correct. It is comparable to the First World War, the Dardanelles etc. Iraq is lost and Afghanistan will go the same way. Those who refuse to study history will suffer the consequences. Unfortunately, we will all have to live with the consequences of a Middle East in disarray, speeading terrorism and other side effects from the assymetric wars we have been pushed into by a criminal elite in Washington and London. .

oldasiahand, Hong Kong,

Only Jenkins and his fellow liberals dare to claim that establishing democracy in Iraq is a 'failure'. You won't get the democratic majority in Iraq joining in with Jenkins and his ilk, that's for sure.

Come to think of it, you won't get the democratic majority in Britain doing so either, if the last General Election is anything to go by. ' Britain elected a prime minister with so strong a majority that he could overwhelm the normal checks placed on his office', writes Jenkins, with barely concealed contempt for such action by his fellow countrymen.

No wonder Jenkins and the rest of the liberal minority want to cut and run from Iraq and Afghanistan. Democratism is the last ideology these craven democraphobes want spread around the world. That's because liberalism, like Islamism, is contemptuous of the will of the democratic majority. Oh, Churchill, thou shouldst be living at this hour!

Terry Daly, London, Great Britain